


Catch & Release

by yallneedtrashjesus



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-06 14:48:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11038383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yallneedtrashjesus/pseuds/yallneedtrashjesus
Summary: Noct and Ardyn meet in the afterlife with no idea who the other is. They simply enjoy fishing at the same lonely pond, unaware that each is drawn there for a reason.Bonus: Catmom Ardyn, Ardyn's first death, and a normal life for Noct.He should have felt glee then, or at least some sense of amusement, but all he wanted was to help them. And with that last thought, he died.Except he didn’t.





	Catch & Release

### Catch & Release

The forest glowed gold with the evening sunlight, lazy and still as the day neared its end. Noctis walked along the grass-covered path, the only sound the rattling of his tackle box held in his right hand; his left held his fishing pole like a lance. 

He came here every evening, and always alone. 

He could have invited Luna, or Prompto, or Ignis, or Gladio, or all of them, but none of them enjoyed fishing as much as he did, and fishing was something he preferred to do solo. Especially here. 

Not only was the hidden pond beautiful and serene, but it offered the best fishing he’d ever known. He often wondered how he always managed to have the place all to himself. Someone had been coming here before him, or came at a different time of the day, perhaps, because although the trail was overgrown and difficult to see, it had already been here before Noct discovered it. For all he knew, it had been used for decades. Centuries, maybe. 

As he grew closer to the rock formations surrounding the entrance, the trees thinned and he could make out the familiar opening in the forest that hinted at the pond’s existence. 

_What’s that?_

Something small, white, and spotted had emerged from the brush and moved onto the trail ahead. A rabbit? 

_Kinda big for a rabbit…._

It turned towards him, sat, and waited. 

He stopped. _Was_ it waiting? Was it watching him?

It didn’t seem afraid, and it certainly didn’t seem to pose any danger to him, so he continued. 

As he grew nearer, he smiled. 

A pair of green eyes met his, and a soft meow escaped what was clearly a calico.

The cat approached slowly as Noct bent down to offer his hand for sniffing. Apparently satisfied, the calico lowered her head and closed her eyes. He scratched her cheek, earning a rub against his leg. When he stood back up, the cat looked at him, her eyes wide, and meowed again as if to ask if he was leaving. 

Then she turned and ran up the path, disappearing around the closest rock formation—heading to the pond.

It would be nice to have _some_ company, he realized. Maybe the cat liked fishing, too. 

He followed, suddenly awash in the absurd notion that cats didn’t actually like to eat fish, at least not freshly caught fish. He knew this somehow— though he couldn’t remember how or why. 

Rounding the rock formation, his eyes widened and he stopped in his tracks. 

A man sat where he normally did, his long legs dangling over the edge of a large rock that sat partially in the water. Noct had never seen anyone quite like the stranger, who wore his dark plum colored hair in a ponytail and who appeared to be wearing a white tunic. It had bell shaped sleeves and an open “V” neckline, like something out of an RPG Prompto might rope him into playing. 

The calico left the man’s side to approach Noct. 

“I see you’ve met Lella.” 

The man’s voice was deep and rich, and when he turned his head, amber orbs met Noct’s. He flashed a brilliant smile. “She probably likes you more than she likes me. She’ll like you even more if you give her one of my baitfish….not that I should encourage such spoiling.”

He reached into a small pail, pinched a fish between his fingers, and offered it to Noct. Lella leapt onto the rock and sniffed the fish in the stranger’s fingers, causing the man to raise the fish high above her head. 

Noct walked out onto the flat rock below the stranger’s rock, setting his tackle box and pole down where the two met. He accepted the fish and held it out for the cat—who greedily accepted. 

“She’s a dear old thing,” said the stranger, watching as the cat devoured the fish and looked to Noct for another. “We’ve been fishing together for as long as I can recall.”

“Do you fish here, or…? I haven’t seen you before.” 

“That’s probably because I normally come at night, and stay until morning.” The man smiled sheepishly. “I enjoy watching the dawn. There’s nothing quite akin to watching the darkness burn away. Although I find something infinitely comforting about the dark, as well.”

“So what are you doing here now, if you don’t mind my asking?” 

The man reached down on his right side and brought a wriggling worm up between his fingers. Carefully, he ran his fishing hook through the worm. The stranger smirked. “Something told me I should linger this morning.” He cast his line into the still water, and paused a moment longer before adding, “Perhaps we were destined to meet.”

Noct smiled. “My name’s Noctis. Everyone calls me Noct, though.”

“Ardyn. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Noctis. I wondered if I’d ever find someone else here.”

He motioned for Noct to join him on the rock. “You came here to fish as well, did you not? I apologize if I’m intruding on a solo venture.” 

Noct gathered his gear and climbed up to join Ardyn. He sat about two feet left of the man. Lella settled between them with her paws tucked in front of her. 

He prepared his own line and lure, then cast it into to the far end of the pond, where the broken pillars of an ancient ruin jutted from the surface. 

“Tell me, Noctis…where are you from? What do you do?”

Noctis smiled, slightly embarrassed. If Ardyn truly didn’t know him, he must not be from Insomnia…or anywhere nearby. Or he lived under a rock. 

“I’m Noctis Lucis Caelum, 114th king of Lucis. The Citadel in Insomnia is my home.” 

“Lucis Caelum….” Ardyn turned and stared, his face unreadable. His hand holding the fishing pole lowered. 

Noct’s brows furrowed, and he looked at Ardyn for an explanation. 

“This is strange. Very strange indeed.” 

“How so?”

“My name is Ardyn _Lucis Caelum_ , and I am also king of Lucis. But I’ve never heard of Insomnia.”

Noct stared at Ardyn hard. Now that he was really looking at him, he did seem familiar. But how? 

Ardyn was staring at him just as intensely, and with equal curiosity. 

How could they both be king of Lucis? How could Ardyn not have heard of Insomnia? 

“Where are _you_ from?” Noctis asked the man. 

“Lucis,” Ardyn replied. “As I told you.”

“Just Lucis? Is that the name of the city, or town?” 

Suddenly Ardyn leaned forward and grabbed Noct’s right wrist, causing him to drop his fishing pole. 

“What’re you— Aaaaahhhh!” 

Everything went white, and pain wracked his body. Unimaginable pain. He tried to pull free from Ardyn’s grip, but the man’s hand was a vice.

A barrage of images entered his mind, one after the other—too quickly to make sense of. Voices echoed in the depths of his mind. Laughter, a mocking voice louder than the rest. Whose? Why couldn’t he make out what the voice was saying? There was only the laughter, so bitter, so cruel. 

And then the images slowed; the voices died. A searing cold bit into his bare back, and his wrists throbbed from his body weight pulling against the irons suspending him from the ceiling. An iron door creaked open and blank faces appeared in the dark; feet echoed against the stone. Rough hands took him by the thighs, the torso, the arms, lifting him and alleviating the pain from the irons. Then he was shoved to his knees on the cold floor, his arms bound behind him with thick rope. And pushed out of the cell. Pushed forward, and dragged by hands at his sides. 

They walked him into the town proper. Straight into the crowd—into a hornet’s nest. Stones and other objects struck his face, his back, every bare inch of him while people shouted “monster,” “blasphemer,” “scourge bringer.” No one dared touch him directly, so they hurled every insult and physical object they could conceive of. A man spit into his face, and with his hands bound, he could only close his eyes and attempt to wipe the saliva from his face with his shoulder. A jerk from the side told him that the indignity was to remain, however—was deserved. The sea of eyes condemned him. 

The sunlight so bright after being in darkness so long. Countless days. Countless attempts to purify his body and soul, the majority of which left marks—if not external, then internal. 

They brought him before a wooden beam in the shape of a “T,” and the shouts intensified. Their rage pulsed within his head like a maddening heartbeat. His hands were momentarily freed, only so that he could be bound to the beam. They retied his hands before him with a longer rope, tossing the remainder up and over the top of the beam and binding his feet. 

His eyes scanned the crowd and the balconies above. And then they lighted on three faces he’d hoped not to find. One because he had taken everything from him, the other two because he couldn’t bear to see the condemnation in their eyes as well. He needed someone, anyone, to believe that he was still a man. Just a man, and a just man…a healer. 

He looked around desperately, but all that met his gaze was hatred. Bloodlust. 

A man in black robes approached, pulling a long dagger from his person. The hilt glistened in the sunlight. Not a cloud blotted the sky. 

He stared into the robed man’s aged face, begging him not to do this. 

The man held his free hand aloft to silence the crowd. One by one, the voices slowly died. The man waited until even the mumbling had ceased before speaking. 

But when the man spoke, he could hear nothing. His lips were moving, but no sounds issued from him. He himself tried to speak, tried to scream, but there was only terrible silence. 

And then the robed man brandished the dagger once more and moved closer. 

Words ricocheted in his head like a bullet: _Your very existence is a blasphemy._

Quicker than he thought possible for such an old man, the dagger sliced across his throat. He saw his own blood spraying before him before the pain registered. His vision was fading now, but not fast enough to cease from realizing that the blood pouring forth from his body was black, and that people were screaming and running. Those who’d been touched by his blood slapped at themselves, tore off their clothes, and begged others to aid them. 

He should have felt glee then, or at least some sense of amusement, but all he wanted was to help them. And with that last thought, he died. 

Except he didn’t. 

He awoke choking on and coughing up his own black blood in a dark place he didn’t recognize. And then the image disappeared. 

He was in a stone prison—a stone tomb? No food, no water, and nothing to pass the time. A narrow slit in the wall served as a window and allowed the light to shine in during the day. And when the light shone, he placed himself under the window, in a corner, trying to hide every inch of his body from the light. Because now the light caused him great pain, and when the light touched him, voices in his head screamed along with him. 

Every night, he dreamt of drowning in his own black blood. Except it wasn’t blood, not really. It would take years before he realized that, however. 

He spent centuries in that tomb. Over a thousand years, probably; he’d lost count. He’d tried to escape, of course. But the gods themselves had done their part to ensure he remained imprisoned on Angelgard. 

After a while, he lost all sense of thirst, hunger, pain, and time. The light ceased to harm him, although he shied from it from habit and preferred the darkness. He would have forgotten how to speak, too, except there were always voices to speak to in the dark. 

This image, too, faded. 

Now he found himself just outside the Citadel. Only it wasn’t the Citadel he knew. It was nighttime, only darker somehow. And he saw himself, but from another’s perspective: The perspective of the man who couldn’t die. 

He watched as he surrounded himself with the spectral images of weapons—thirteen of them, and all ghostly blue. The body he occupied did the same, although his were red. Unable to stop himself, they ran at one another. The body he occupied was full of rage, and Noct’s own face was twisted in challenge. 

Noct was faster, and hit him with every weapon he had, one after another. 

And then he was choking on his own black blood again, watching it spray from his body as Noct himself plunged a long silver blade into his chest and withdrew it. He dropped to his knees and fell backwards.

He stared into his own blue eyes, saw the understanding there. Not anger, not hate, not pity. Empathy. 

Noct blinked and found himself at the pond once more, staring into the face of Ardyn, the man who’d killed his beloved before his eyes. The man who’d captured and tortured his best friend. The man who’d orchestrated his father’s death and the deaths of so many in Insomnia and the outlying areas. The man who’d thrown Eos into darkness and become more daemon than human. All to ensure that Noct obtained the Crystal’s power. All to ensure Noct’s—and his own—annihilation. 

As he looked at Ardyn, cuts, slashes, and abrasions appeared across the man’s face, neck, and torso. He didn’t need to look at himself to know the same was happening; he felt myriad wounds opening across his body. 

They’d utterly destroyed one another. 

They’d died. 

Ardyn placed his hand behind Noct’s head and leaned in so that their foreheads touched. Tears streamed down his face, mingling with garish red. Now that Noct remembered the man, he found it strange that Ardyn was crying. All the same, he was crying, too. He placed his own hand on the back of Ardyn’s head, weaving his fingers into the wavy plum locks. 

When he’d headed for Insomnia after emerging from the Crystal, he’d tried to imagine what Ardyn had gone through to make him the dark individual he’d battled in the Citadel—had thought he understood. Similarly, he knew now that Ardyn realized what life he’d taken from Noct, what pain he’d caused not only him, but everyone in Eos. He felt it all at once, when he’d grabbed Noct’s wrist. 

Ardyn knew exactly how far he’d strayed from his true self, and now Noct did, too. Without knowing their individual and collective past, neither Noct nor Ardyn had understood what the pond represented. They hadn’t understood that they kept missing each other, each drawn to this place, yet not knowing why.

They hadn’t been able to forgive one another, and thus they hadn’t been able to move on. 

Noct wrapped both arms around Ardyn’s back, hugging him as he might his own father or brother, his chin on Ardyn’s shoulder. 

Family. 

Ardyn slowly returned the embrace, hanging his head over Noct’s shoulder like a child. He sobbed. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.” 

“So am I,” Noct answered. He held Ardyn for a long time, knowing that the man hadn’t felt love in ages. And as they held one another, their wounds mended. 

The pond slowly disappeared and white light enveloped them. 

***

Noct mashed the controller’s “x” button, repeatedly smashing his opponent with his fists. His mother sat in a chair nearby, sipping coffee. It was Saturday morning, and sunlight streamed through the windows. 

The front door opened, and his father stepped inside with the morning paper, having just returned from his walk. 

“Noctis, the little neighbor girl is outside. She wishes to know if you would like to come out and play with her.”

“L-luna? Luna’s outside?”

His father smiled. 

“Oh, Regis, don’t tease him so!” said his mother. But her eyes were smiling, even if her mouth wasn’t. 

Noct quickly paused the game and leapt to his feet. He ran to his father, but stopped before the open door, suddenly shy. 

But his father put a hand on his shoulder and guided him outside. 

It wasn’t Luna that awaited him on the porch, but his great-uncle. And he held something in his arms— something small, white, and spotted. 

Uncle Ardyn smiled as Noct gasped in delight. 

“Hello, Noct. I brought you a present.”

Noct ran to his uncle, holding out his hands to receive the small cat. 

Uncle Ardyn carefully transferred the calico to his nephew’s arms, helping him hold the cat properly. 

“Her name is Lella. Her mother abandoned her when she was very small, but I nursed her back to health. She’s about three months old now.”

Noct hugged the cat to him, laughing as she crawled up his chest and perched on his shoulder. 

“Your father said you could keep her. I trust you’ll take good care of her?”

Noct looked from his great-uncle to his father, beaming. “Of course, Uncle! Thank you!” 

He was about to head inside with Lella when a delicate squeal sounded from the driveway.

“Ooooo! Is that a kitten?”

Ardyn and Regis turned to regard the blonde-haired girl. Of course they’d seen her around: Luna. She was a few years older than Noctis, who was nearly eight now. 

With his family around, Noct felt less shy than usual. 

“This is Lella!” Noct announced, holding the kitten against his chest. 

“I love calicos!” Luna gushed, running up to Noctis and peering down at the kitten. 

“Cali…what?” Noct asked. 

Luna smiled as she delicately brushed the small head with three fingers. “A calico. See her pattern? White, with orange and brown spots? Calicos are always girl cats. Oh, she’s so cute!”

“I’m sure Noct wouldn’t mind if you came and visited her,” Ardyn offered. Regis elbowed him. 

Noct blushed, and tried to turn away to hide his embarrassment. 

Regis stepped forward. “Luna, would you like to come inside? We could make cookies, and the two of you could get to know Lella.”

“That would be lovely,” Luna replied. 

Ardyn chuckled. “I know I would love some cookies. What say you, Noct?”

Noct grinned. “Yeah, that sounds good.” 

“After you, Luna,” said Regis, ushering the girl inside.


End file.
